Wilkins Investment Counsel Inc. Sells 8,550 Shares of Trimble Inc. $TRMB

Wilkins Investment Counsel Inc. lowered its holdings in Trimble Inc. (NASDAQ:TRMB) by 24.1% during the third quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The firm owned 26,900 shares of the scientific and technical instruments company’s stock after selling 8,550 shares during the quarter. Wilkins Investment Counsel Inc.’s holdings in Trimble were worth $2,196,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. SG Americas Securities LLC boosted its position in Trimble by 30.9% in the 3rd quarter. SG Americas Securities LLC now owns 96,052 shares of the scientific and technical instruments company’s stock valued at $7,843,000 after buying an additional 22,650 shares during the last quarter. Sumitomo Mitsui DS Asset Management Company Ltd lifted its stake in shares of Trimble by 31.5% during the third quarter. Sumitomo Mitsui DS Asset Management Company Ltd now owns 146,283 shares of the scientific and technical instruments company’s stock valued at $11,944,000 after acquiring an additional 35,015 shares during the period. Robeco Institutional Asset Management B.V. increased its position in Trimble by 123.4% in the third quarter. Robeco Institutional Asset Management B.V. now owns 237,294 shares of the scientific and technical instruments company’s stock worth $19,375,000 after purchasing an additional 131,056 shares during the period. Swiss National Bank raised its holdings in Trimble by 8.0% during the 2nd quarter. Swiss National Bank now owns 744,000 shares of the scientific and technical instruments company’s stock worth $56,529,000 after purchasing an additional 55,300 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Boston Partners lifted its position in Trimble by 14.4% during the 2nd quarter. Boston Partners now owns 4,170,179 shares of the scientific and technical instruments company’s stock valued at $318,285,000 after purchasing an additional 525,214 shares during the period. Institutional investors own 93.21% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several brokerages have recently commented on TRMB. Wells Fargo & Company initiated coverage on shares of Trimble in a research report on Thursday, November 13th. They set an “overweight” rating and a $94.00 price target for the company. Weiss Ratings reiterated a “hold (c)” rating on shares of Trimble in a research report on Wednesday, October 8th. Piper Sandler restated an “overweight” rating and issued a $97.00 price target on shares of Trimble in a research report on Friday, November 7th. Berenberg Bank set a $95.00 price objective on Trimble and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Friday, October 3rd. Finally, KeyCorp upgraded Trimble from a “sector weight” rating to an “overweight” rating and set a $99.00 target price on the stock in a report on Monday, December 15th. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, eight have given a Buy rating and two have given a Hold rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $96.78.

Trimble Price Performance

Shares of TRMB opened at $70.24 on Thursday. The stock has a 50 day simple moving average of $79.27 and a 200 day simple moving average of $80.38. Trimble Inc. has a 52-week low of $52.91 and a 52-week high of $87.50. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.24, a quick ratio of 0.86 and a current ratio of 1.00. The firm has a market capitalization of $16.71 billion, a PE ratio of 48.11, a P/E/G ratio of 2.43 and a beta of 1.59.

Trimble (NASDAQ:TRMB) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, November 5th. The scientific and technical instruments company reported $0.81 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.72 by $0.09. The firm had revenue of $901.20 million for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $870.30 million. Trimble had a net margin of 9.93% and a return on equity of 10.73%. The business’s revenue was up 2.9% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the previous year, the firm posted $0.83 earnings per share. Trimble has set its FY 2025 guidance at 3.040-3.120 EPS and its Q4 2025 guidance at 0.910-0.990 EPS. Sell-side analysts predict that Trimble Inc. will post 2.37 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Trimble announced that its Board of Directors has approved a stock repurchase program on Friday, December 5th that authorizes the company to buyback $1.00 billion in shares. This buyback authorization authorizes the scientific and technical instruments company to reacquire up to 5.1% of its shares through open market purchases. Shares buyback programs are generally a sign that the company’s board believes its stock is undervalued.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other Trimble news, CEO Robert G. Painter sold 7,500 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Tuesday, January 13th. The stock was sold at an average price of $80.88, for a total transaction of $606,600.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer owned 34,397 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $2,782,029.36. This trade represents a 17.90% decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available through this hyperlink. Also, Director Kaigham Gabriel sold 1,718 shares of Trimble stock in a transaction on Thursday, November 6th. The stock was sold at an average price of $81.00, for a total transaction of $139,158.00. Following the transaction, the director directly owned 15,170 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $1,228,770. This trade represents a 10.17% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The SEC filing for this sale provides additional information. In the last three months, insiders sold 27,084 shares of company stock valued at $2,183,951. Corporate insiders own 0.54% of the company’s stock.

Trimble Company Profile

Trimble Inc (NASDAQ: TRMB) is a technology company that develops hardware, software and services to improve the productivity and connectivity of customers across the construction, agriculture, geospatial, transportation and logistics, and natural resources sectors. The company’s offerings center on advanced positioning technologies — including GNSS/GPS receivers, inertial sensors and laser scanning — integrated with application-specific software and cloud services to enable precise measurement, modeling, machine control and workflow automation for field and office operations.

Trimble’s product portfolio spans surveying and geospatial instruments (total stations, mobile mapping and terrestrial laser scanners), construction solutions (machine control systems, site positioning and estimating), agriculture systems (auto-steer, guidance and application-control platforms), and fleet and transportation telematics.